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Latham & Watkins goes for promotion of Associates to Partners

Latham & Watkins has embarked on an intra-firm partnership promotion program, wherein 26 associates in U.S., Europe, and Asia were promoted to partners. The announcement of promotions, which will take effect in January 2007, was followed by impressive financial figures registered by the firm that witnessed a 17 percent growth in the turnover to $1.41 billion during the last fiscal year. This development has allowed the firm to focus on its key practice areas and simultaneously ensure that uniformity is maintained across the firm.

The firm's U.S. offices witnessed the maximum amount of promotions, with five in New York, four in Los Angeles, three in Washington DC, two each in Orange County, Silicon Valley, San Francisco, and one in San Diego. Additionally, there were two promotions in Hong Kong and one each in Frankfurt, London, Paris, and Singapore. During the selection of the partners, the firm looked for a balance of experience and expertise each of its five key departments - corporate, finance, litigation, tax, and environment. Nearly 40 percent of the appointed partners specialize in corporate and finance law.

11-03-2006

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Brown & Thelen Reid agrees to tie the knot

On December 1, 2006, construction, energy, and project finance pundits Thelen Reid & Priest will join forces with Brown Raysman Millstein Felder & Steiner, experts in technology, and real estate finance practices. The move will create a combined team of more than 615 lawyers on board working under the banner of Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner LLP.

The merger will help clients of both the firms gain access to a broad array of specialized services in practice areas like construction, energy, litigation, technology, outsourcing, intellectual property, e-commerce, media, and communications. The firm will have seven offices in major markets of the US and a new office in Shanghai. Altogether, 242 attorneys in California and 371 on the East Coast will man offices for the firm.

Stephen V. O'Neal and Julian S. Millstein will act as Co-Chairs of the new firm, and Thomas E. Hill will serve as the Managing Partner of Operations. Both firms hope the merger is the beginning of further expansion and a greater geographical reach.

11-02-2006

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It’s destination Boston for U.S. law firms

It's destination Boston for a few prominent U.S. Law firms of late. After Greenberg Traurig, DLA Piper and Seyfarth Shaw made the move, Pepper Hamilton is putting the final touches on plans for its own Boston office. Though the new office will have around 15 attorneys, the firm plans to expand capacity to house at least 50 in the near future. Additionally, the firm has hired Leonard Schneidman as Of Counsel. Schneidman, former partner in tax group in Foley Hoag, is an expert in international tax planning and corporate transactions. At present, assisting Schneidman will be four or five attorneys from the firm's Philadelphia office who will basically concentrate on corporate, tax, private equity, and life sciences; later, they will expand on to biotechnology, intellectual property, and white-collar litigation work.

Personal injury experts Eisenberg Rothweiler of erstwhile Eisenberg, Rothweiler, Winkler, Eisenberg, & Jeck has opened up an office in Boston with the addition of prominent attorney Alex MacDonald. MacDonald earlier served Robinson & Cole leading the firm's mass torts practice group. With his joining, Philadelphia-based Eisenberg Rothweiler will be take up a new moniker MacDonald, Rothweiler, & Eisenberg for its Boston office. The move to include MacDonald to the firm stems from its desire to move to the national arena from a more regional identity based in its mass torts practice. Along with MacDonald, one associate and a few cases also join the new firm. Eisenberg Rothweiler mainstay is mainly on medical malpractice, products liability, crashworthiness, and mass torts.

In yet another move to Boston, McCarter & English merged with Gadsby Hannah, a Boston-based law firm, while Wolf Block Schorr & Solis-Cohen had embarked on the east coast expansion last year, under the captainship of Robert Crowe.

11-02-2006

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Akerman Senterfitt crosses the 500 mark

Time to celebrate at Akerman Senterfitt! The firm officially crossed the 500 lawyers mark in 12 offices because of their continued attempts to hire more attorneys and effort to strengthen their global position. Behind the firm's spectacular achievement lie contributions made by their offices in New York, Los Angeles, and Northern Virginia, as well as nine Florida offices. However the firm still strives to become a leader among its peers and for even greater expansion in the future. Akerman Senterfitt's Florida-based office is the firm's largest and in all, the firm boasts more than 1,100 people in its nationwide roster.

Since its inception in 1920, the firm has been successful in adding well known names to its rolls, the most recent being the 2005 recruitment of several prominent litigators from top federal departments, agencies and blue-chip companies. Akerman Senterfitt's lawyers represent high profile clients in a wide variety of legal practice areas.

Akerman Sentefitt lawyers also carved out a niche for themselves through their legal acumen. Nearly a hundred of them have been listed along with first-rate U.S. attorneys of repute, either among Best Lawyers in America, or the Chambers' America's leading lawyers who has also placed the firm first among those practicing corporate/M&A, antitrust, insurance and zoning/land use.

11-01-2006

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Diverse diversity definitions for U.S. law firms

Even as top-drawer U.S. law firms like Baker & McKenzie trumpet diversity achievements at home, their offices across the border sing an entirely different tune. With total disregard to proclaimed gender sensitivity and sermons on diversity ideals, these firms' Mexican offices tow the line of high-profile companies and often come up with ads for staff placement in the most provocative and discriminating note which read like ads for beauty pageants.

Placement ads emphasizing "male", "pretty face", "with photograph" is published openly in dailies whereby potential candidates who do not fit into the "right" candidature are surely disappointed. According to the Arkansas Demokrat Gazette, despite the fact that Mexico's constitution and federal labor code prohibit discrimination based on age, sex, ethnicity, religion, marital status, health and other factors, Mexicans rarely file employment discrimination lawsuits since seeking redress is a costly and drawn out process. As a result of such blatant discrimination, the number of unemployed Mexicans is increasingly annually and the country's economy is suffering in today's competitive global arena.

Such ads in the United States which would invite catastrophe and jeopardizing a firm's reputation, are often allowed by the same firm's office in Mexico due to paucity of jobs as well Mexican authorities' Machiavellian attitude in enforcing anti-discrimination laws. The firms and companies either plead ignorance or play the blame-game on their Mexican counterparts, but the fact remains that precisely too little efforts are directed at redressing the offenses or rectifying the wrongs.

11-01-2006

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Major headway in Dewey, Orrick merger talks

Standing at the head of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, Ralph Baxter is pleased with having transformed it from a provincial West Coast entity to one of the most successful names in the law firm arena. With 1000 lawyers and a determined mind-set, Orrick a.k.a Baxter's ambitious expansion plans are on the verge of fruition as the Management and Executive Committees of leading international law firms Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe and Dewey Ballantine respectively made initial recommendations to their partners about combining into a new entity with the moniker Dewey Orrick.

Dewey Orrick would have 1,500 lawyers in 21 offices on three continents, with combined revenue of approximately $1 billion. Almost one-third of Dewey Orrick's lawyers would reside outside the United States, and with 500 lawyers in its New York office, the firm would boast the seventh-largest New York office of any law firm. Ralph Baxter, presently serving as Chairman, Orrick and Morton A. Pierce, Chairman of Dewey, would co-chair the new firm. Baxter would also additionally serve as Presiding Partner. The merger awaits the approval of the firm's partners, which is expected to occur in mid-December.

Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe focuses on litigation, complex and novel finance, and innovative corporate transactions. Dewey Ballantine handles some of the largest and most complex corporate transactions, litigation and tax matters in areas such as M&A, private equity, project finance, corporate finance, corporate reorganization and bankruptcy, antitrust, intellectual property, sports law, structured finance and international trade. With Dewey's stronghold on the Wall Street, Orrick foresees establishing an overriding presence in the world's finance capital catapulting them into the ranks of the top firms.

10-30-2006

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NAWL survey reveals dismal position of women lawyers in law firms

The results of the first National Survey on Retention and Promotion of Women in Law Firms conducted by the National Association of Women Lawyers (NAWL) among 200 U.S. law firms were recently released. The survey, which gathered "accurate data concerning the leadership status of women lawyers in private practice" in many prominent U.S. law firms, revealed that women constitute 45% of associates, 28% of Counsel, 26% of non-equity partners, and 16% of equity partners. Only 5% of managing partners are women. The NAWL concluded that high-level decisions, policies, and practices relating to the retention and promotion of women lawyers are still being decided in male bastions.

NAWL was critical of the results' apparent "50/15/15 conundrum", which highlights the fact that while 50% of the J.D.'s churned out each year by law schools in the country are women, for more than 15 years only about 15% of these women could climb up to the level of partners and chief legal officers.

The survey sought insight into the emerging role of women at top law firms and based its results on responses gathered from 103 individuals. Queries were sent to law firms across the country about total law firm size, the different types of partnership opportunities, where women stand vis-à-vis men, women's role in firm governance, and women's compensation relative to that of men at similar levels of seniority. The survey was part designed in part to provide potential lawyers with a clear picture of and benchmarks for how women progress in law firm hierarchies. The survey, which was initiated earlier in 2006, is part of a multi-year initiative by NAWL to address gender inequality in the "upper echelons of the legal profession and encourage those in leadership positions to take productive steps to cure those inequities".

10-30-2006

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